Moving along...

It is about 3:00pm on Friday and we are just catching up on e-mails and booking a flight before heading out of McLeod Ganj on the 8pm bus tonight. We are on our way up to Manali where we will stay for 3ish nights and then make the big journey to Leh. It takes about 10 hours from here to Manali and then another 26 to Leh. We just booked a flight from Leh back to Delhi so we only have to make this trip once by bus! We have had a lovely time here in McLeod Ganj and it has been so nice to be away from the harassment of touts in some of the bigger cities. Yesterday we did a trek with the Irish couple up to Triund and got caught in the rain. The approx. 5 hour hike ended up taking us 10 hours! I have some lovely blisters that I acquired as well! We slept great last night because of all the exercise. Taylor woke up this morning with the cold that I have been fighting for the last week or so... really sore throat, stuffy nose, snot, headache... I guess it is hard to avoid with so many people and new germs in India but hopefully we can get healthy in the next while here in the mountains.

This post is all over the place... Just trying to get some info in before our internet runs out...

Hope Birch Bay weather is good and everyone is having fun. Mom, if you are able to check these in Birch Bay on someones computer can you let me know? I thought Clay and Lisa would have their computer there. Marie, I hope that visiting with the Aunties is lovely... wish we could be there to see them. I would have really loved to meet them. I guess we will just have to go to Ireland to see them! Dad, is the fishing trip this weekend? Catch lots of fish and save me some Halibut for when we get back!

That's it for now. Talk soon.

One last thing... if anyone is following the news... I am sure you have heard about the bombings in Mumbai. Just to let you know, we are FAR, FAR away from there and have no plan of going anywhere near the South of India so please don't worry.

Love us!
xoxo

Holy Water = Holy Shit

So while we were in Amritsar, we went inside the middle section of the golden temple which is in the middle of a large holy pool that Sikh's come to bathe in... (Google image search golden temple to see what it looks like!) The middle of the Golden temple is where the original Sikh Holy book is taken everyday so that a Sikh 'priest' can chant verses from it over loud speakers from 4am until 10pm everyday. On our last night there we went to the ceremony in which they walk out to the Golden Temple, put the book into a big carriage and carry it back to a room were it is held to the next day so that it can all be repeated again...It was quite a fancy ceremony for a book--they adorned the carriage with flowers and pillows and fresh sheets before retrieving it...after all of this, we went to the middle bit and as we were walking through a Sikh man grabbed my wrist and pointed to where all the Sikhs were taking holy water and drinking it and dripping it on their backs and praying...he told us that we must drink a drop as a drop could change our lives...following the cliche, when in Rome, we gladly went up, cupped our hands, drank a sip and instantly realized that this holy water and the large bath surrounding the temple were one and the same! The taste was horrid but we were hoping a bit of holy water may help us along our way--turns out, the only way this holy water changed our lives is that it gave us diarrhea that we never had before! So we have been battling a bit of upset stomach the last few days, but other than that, things have been great!